There was speculation that Deion Sanders was at fault for his son Shedeur’s NFL Draft slide.
The Browns didn’t take Shedeur until the fifth round, the No. 144 overall pick, after Shedeur was viewed as a consensus first-rounder.
But the quarterback’s slide wasn’t impacted by Deion the way many thought. At least that’s how Browns GM Andrew Berry explained it to local reporters.
“I felt like our personal relationship and interactions with Deion, that’s really been all positive from our perspective, and I mean that organizationally, not just me and Kevin (Stefanski),” Berry said. “But really, all of us who have interacted with Deion and the people out in Colorado. We don’t typically penalize prospects for their parents, so to speak. So I can’t say if that was a factor or not for other teams. But that was not a significant factor for us.”
Frankly, that makes more sense than the alternative, a universe where somehow a potential franchise QB’s father prevented all 32 NFL teams from drafting him.
Clearly, there were some concerns about the big picture with Shedeur, whether that’s his own flaws or those of his family.
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Berry’s comments might leave everyone a tad confused, given that the Browns actually took a different quarterback, Dillon Gabriel, two rounds before Shedeur.
But for whatever reason, the Browns then felt good enough to still trade up in the fifth round to get Shedeur, too.
“He’s highly accurate, can play well from the pocket, very productive college career, and we felt like it wasn’t necessarily the the plan going into the weekend to select two quarterbacks, but as we talked about, we do believe in best player available,” Berry said. “We do believe in positional value. And we didn’t necessarily expect him to be available in the fifth round. And so we love adding competition to every position room. and adding him to compete with the guys that are already in there.”
The role that Deion plays in his QB son’s NFL future will likely be more minimal than most expect. That would certainly line up with how Berry described the relationship throughout the pre-draft process.
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